Blood was leaking down the back of Michael’s old leather jacket, gushing out from a relatively small bullet-wound. That crimson liquid seemed to radiate an incredible and terrifying power that didn’t seem to belong on Earth.

Only those with psychic power or extremely sharp senses would be able to notice anything strange about it. However, while ‘normal’ people wouldn’t be able to tell, the demonic rats, cockroaches, and pigeons could definitely smell the potent mana wafting into the air from miles away.

He was riding upon a large silver bike that he had stolen and traveling along Eastern Avenue, with hordes of beasts that were at least the size of wolves. Some of them actually were dogs, but there were also mutated alley cats, mice, and even squirrels from Patterson Park.

“What the fucking cuntsauce is this bullshit?! Stop chasing me you assholes! There’s lots of other people to kill and eat, right?! Look, there’s a nice family of four… zombies, oh god! You’ve gotta be kidding me!” Since he was attracting such a huge crowd of ‘infected’ creatures, he also drew the attention of the news and military helicopters that were flying over the city.

Spotlights were blinding him, as he almost crashed into a car that was parked in the middle of the crosswalk. He just barely managed to go around the front bumper as he heard the miniguns revving up.

Michael yelled “Don’t you dare shoot at me you dirty whores!” at one that was a hundred meters above and in front of him, but there wasn’t much else he could do about it. It wasn’t as if he believed that those three hollow-point bullets in his glock would be able to do anything against that chopper’s windshield; even if he could shoot it down, there would be very little benefit for him anyway.

However, just as it was about to mow him down, along with everything behind him, a hundred zombified pigeons suddenly crashed into the rotors. The helicopter didn’t spiral out of control, but it did lose some altitude and veer to the left a bit, causing the two gatling guns to start firing into the shops to his right.

Within a few seconds though, they began obliterating the hordes of monstrous beasts and people that were chasing Michael. Of course, he was still hit by shrapnel from the shattered windows and a chunk of brick flew off of the building, smacking him in the ear.

He obviously fell off of the bike and tumbled across the ground for a few moments, before standing up and starting to run into the next intersection. However, a dump-truck, without headlights on, sped through and ran him over.

Then it pinned his body against the top of a bus that had flipped over on its side. Michael screamed “Holy monkey fucks! Ow~, owowow~! Shitty donkey dicks~!” Aside from his skull being fractured, both arms were totally mangled, half of his ribs were definitely broken, and there was a high probability that he was paralyzed from the waist down.

As he was losing consciousness, he complained “I didn’t even… get to shoot anybody…” Once he passed out, the blood that was pooling below his feet started to bubble and boil.

The crimson liquid transformed into a fog, which completely devoured and consumed everything around Michael’s mangled body. Asphalt, the front of the dump-truck, and the top of the city-bus were all broken down and turned into chaotic mana. After that, it was all sucked into his mouth, as he gasped for air. However, before he could fall upon the ground, he abruptly vanished.

 

Over a thousand miles to the south of Baltimore, a beautiful woman was standing on the deck of a relatively small beach house in Florida. She was wearing a black bikini-top and jean-shorts that revealed her fairly muscular, lightly tanned body; at six feet, she was considered rather tall for the local average.

Jane Cinagra was a twenty-six year old, who had just recently won a few million dollars through the state lottery. It seemed like a lot at first, but she quickly realized that after taxes, she definitely wasn’t ‘set for life’ as she had hoped.

However, it was plenty if she only wanted to live comfortably for a decade or so. Unfortunately, things never go as planned; there were tears in her light-blue eyes, as she gazed up at the nearly full Moon and murmured “Carly… you need to get better.”

Her daughter was seven, but she was diagnosed with leukemia almost the day after Jane had won the lottery. A couple months before that, her husband died in a motorcycle accident.

She cursed “Is this supposed to be some kinda joke, God?! First you kill Joey off, then you get my motherfucking hopes up by solving my money problems, and once it looks like everything gonna be fine… Now you wanna take my baby?! Fuck you!”

If she had been watching the news or even checked Facenovel for a moment, she would have been even more upset. Nearly all of her relatives lived in Maryland, and those who she was closest to had all been in either Baltimore City or very close to it.

Suddenly, she heard a dog barking and howling, so she gazed down towards the beach. “Jake~, what’re you doin out there?! Holy shit, is that a person?!” It was dark so she couldn’t see clearly from her elevated deck, but after she went down the stairs and reached the shore, she was able to get a much closer look.

“Oh my god!” A dozen meters away from the crystal-clear, shallow water, there was what seemed like a mutilated corpse floating around. Her golden retriever wanted to go out there, but she grabbed his collar and started calling the police. A handful of small tiger sharks were nibbling at the body, but most just tore apart his legs.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure there’s a dead guy who just washed up on my beach!” As she was saying that, a large wave strangely carried him onto the pure-white sand, before crashing at her feet. When she looked down, she shouted “Never mind! I think he’s still breathing! You guys gotta get here fast though… I don’t think he’s gonna make it! I’m at…”

After hanging up, she knelt down and muttered “What the hell was he doing wearing a jacket in this kinda weather?” Even though she knew that she probably wasn’t supposed to touch him, she put the phone away and placed her right hand into his bulging left pant-pocket.

When she pulled out the wallet and saw his ID, she gasped, staring at his mangled face in horror. Once the initial shock was over, she screamed “Mike! Oh my god, Cuz, what the fuck happened to you?! How the hell did you even get here?! Did somebody like, kidnap and torture you, then dump you into the ocean to dispose of your corpse?!”

He was obviously still unconscious and unable to answer her questions. In the left pocket of his leather jacket was a scratched up glock, which she quickly took from him while whispering “Don’t worry, whatever sketchy drug-cartel shit you were up to, I’ll make sure that you aren’t carrying anything incriminating… Jesus!”

As she checked the inside of his jacket, she saw a huge butcher knife that was stabbed straight through the right side of his abdomen, with the tip poking out the left side. Then there were three bend and deformed pieces of black metal that were embedded inside of his sternum.

Since it was more than likely that her house and beach was about to become a crime-scene, Jane yelled “I’m really sorry Cuz, but I gotta go get rid of this real fast! I promise I’ll be back in a sec!” She ran for half a mile to the north, before tossing the gun out into the ocean and by the time that she returned, a squad car and an ambulance had arrived in her driveway.

When the paramedics and cops saw the body, they were all thinking the same thing: “How the hell is this guy even alive?!” However, they were professionals and had obviously seen their fair share miracles or freak-shows, so Michael was quickly rushed to the nearest hospital.